HARRISBURG (TNS) — A woman charged in her 5-year-old son’s drowning in the Susquehanna River tried to persuade her other children to lie about the circumstances of the death while talking to investigators, police said in court documents.
Autumn L. Vossler was recently charged with four felony counts of child endangerment and one count of involuntary manslaughter in connection to the Aug. 29, 2021, drowning death of her son Romin Harmon, who police said fell into the river while playing on the bank near Bainbridge in Lancaster County.
Harmon’s body was found after a five-hour search on some rocks just north of the Falmouth Access Boat Launch, according to Chief Deputy Coroner Eric Bieber’s report. Bieber classified the death as accidental, as a result of drowning.
The boy was scheduled to start kindergarten the next day.
Vossler at first told Susquehanna Regional police she was walking along the river in Conoy Township with her four children, until they ran ahead of her. When she caught up, Vossler said she realized Harmon fell into the river and drowned, according to an affidavit of probable cause.
But in police body camera footage, one of Vossler’s surviving children was recorded saying, “Stop lying mommy. We never saw you, we snuck out of the house,” the affidavit said. Court documents said the child was also heard saying, “Mommy wasn’t there” and “we wanted to go swimming, mommy said no, we just ran.”
The affidavit said Harmon did not know how to swim. Authorities said he drowned after a period of rains that had created higher water levels with fast moving currents.
In interviews, Vossler’s children told police she told them to say she was with them at the river so she would not be arrested, according to the affidavit.
Vossler has a history of “negligent caretaking” dating back to 2018, according to court documents. In multiple instances, the children were found walking along busy roadways without adult supervision — sometimes amid freezing temperatures, the affidavit said.
“The defendant’s continued deliberate lack of supervision endangered the welfare of her children by not supervising them or providing the care needed to keep them safe,” Susquehanna Regional police Officer Jeffrey Sosnoski wrote in the affidavit.
Susquehanna Regional police credited the Lancaster County District Attorney’s office, and child welfare officials in Potter and Lancaster counties for assisting in the investigation.
Online court records show Vossler is being held at the Lancaster County Prison and has a preliminary hearing scheduled for Jan. 18, in front of Magisterial District Judge Randall Miller.
